Week 1:
This week’s theme is “In the Beginning.” (According to “The Sound of Music,” the beginning is a very good place to start.) Who was the first person you wanted to find when you started your genealogy journey? Was there a family member who sparked your interest, maybe by giving you a bunch of genealogy “stuff”? This would be a great week to write about them!

 

The year is 2004. I just moved from Cincinnati, Ohio to Fargo, MI due to my husband’s job. Fargo, MI is a one stop (notice I didn’t say stoplight) town in St Clair County near our current home in Port Huron. We were renting a home while we waited for our house in Ohio to sell. I had not found a job yet and one day as a sit watching tv an ad for Ancestry.com came on and I thought ‘What the heck’. I knew at that point that my grandpa’s grandpa was Percy Archibald and his dad was Walter and mom was Olivia. Given generational timing I knew he would have been born in the 1860s timeframe and I knew Percy was from Georgia. I went to the Ancestry.com typed in the search bar Percy Archibald born 1865 with a plus or minus of 5 years. The first search result was a census record from 1870, when I opened the census record it showed Percy Archibald as the son of Walter and Olivia with other siblings but the kicker was they were living in Port Huron, Michigan.  Port Huron today has a population of around 30,000 and in 1870 a population of less than 6000. What are the odds that the same small town I just moved to was where my family lived for 3 years before they headed south to warmer climes. I was immediately hooked and found out that the Archibald’s were from Nova Scotia, Percy’s father came to Michigan as a Lumberman and then eventually made the trek southward to Georgia and Florida. Following I will introduce you to Percy Archibald:

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Percy Scott Archibald was born on August 14, 1867, in the tranquil town of Truro, Colchester, in Nova Scotia, Canada. His early life was one of migration, as his family sought new opportunities in North America. By 1870, when Percy was just three years old, the Archibald family had moved to Port Huron, St. Clair, Michigan. There, young Percy began to experience the bustling energy of a growing American town. The family stayed only briefly in Port Huron due to Walter (Percy's father) taking a job in Alpena, Michigan in 1873. How long they stayed in Alpena in unknown but by 1878, Percy’s family's journey took him to Essex, Ontario, where he spent his teenage years. The lush countryside and thriving trade of Ontario offered a contrast to his earlier life, shaping his youth with the experiences of both rural simplicity and the promise of industrial progress.

In 1886 the family decided to relocate to central Florida in hope of better opportunities and health. Somehow along the way Percy stopped in Waycross, Georgia and decided to stay.

Percy’s life took a transformative turn when, at 28, he married Celestial (Lessie) Dalton Woodard on November 20, 1895, in Ware, Georgia. Together, they began a life in Waycross, Ware County, Georgia, a bustling railroad hub that likely provided them with opportunities and a vibrant community. Their union was blessed with four children:

• Marybelle Archibald (1899–1953), their eldest, who grew up to carry on her father's legacy into the mid-20th century.
• Sadie Archibald (1902–1984), who lived a long and fulfilling life, witnessing immense societal changes during her lifetime.
• Willoughby Newton Archibald (1904–1965), a son who continued the Archibald name and thrived in the years after his father’s passing.
• Percy Archibald Jr. (1906–1909), the youngest, whose life was tragically brief, passing away just a year after his father's untimely death.

Percy worked hard to provide for his family in Waycross, building a home and life far from the Canadian provinces of his birth. However, tragedy struck in 1908 when Percy’s life was cut short at the age of 40. He died from blood poisoning after cutting himself with a razor, an all-too-common danger in the pre-antibiotic era.

His death, reported in an Atlanta newspaper just two days later, brought sorrow to those who knew him. On the same day of his passing, Percy was laid to rest in Lott Cemetery, Waycross, Georgia, in old section 4, lot 10, grave 7.

The Archibald family carried on after Percy’s passing, with Lessie marrying Edward Parker Fairchild in 1910 and raising the children in the shadow of their father’s memory. Percy’s life, though brief, was marked by resilience, migration, and the enduring connections of family. His journey from Nova Scotia to Georgia encapsulates the spirit of adventure and determination, and his legacy lives on through his descendants, who remember the sacrifices and achievements of a man who bridged nations and generations.